15 Comments

1. OJ:

It is interesting how Paul R. Pillar just days ago concluded something completely different in regards to the WMD intelligence. Rewriting history by painting a different intelligence environment than was actually the case, constitutes misleading the public.

http://www.rightviews.com/article.php?id=346

Feb 21, 2006 - 9:30 am 2. dclydew:

Are you really saying that the National Intelligence Advisor for the Middle East during 200-2005 seems more likely to mislead the public than the conspiracy theory Prophets from this weekends summit?

Feb 21, 2006 - 9:48 am 3. OJ:

dclydew: I think you answered your own rhetorical question…

You must understand that Pillar has been out of favor with the White House for quite some time and has an axe to grind. Clearly, presenting a GLOBAL group-think scenario as the reason for not finding any weapons in Iraq stretches beyond what is reasonable. The people you call conspiracy prophets are presenting opinions/evidence that have previously been voiced in other quarters, especially by the Israelis.

Pillar’s attack piece seeks to rewrite history as to the actual intelligence situation prior to the invasion. Everyone, including the previous Clinton administration, all foreign intelligence services and even Saddam (apparently) believed that there was a weapons program in Iraq. Clearly, not acting on this would be irresponsible. Attempting to change perceptions of this fact by presenting a hypothetical psychological analysis of the bureaucracy of our intelligence community is equally irresponsible…

Feb 22, 2006 - 10:19 am 4. OJ:

dclydew: I think you answered your own rhetorical question…

You must understand that Pillar has been out of favor with the White House for quite some time and has an axe to grind. Clearly, presenting a GLOBAL group-think scenario as the reason for not finding any weapons in Iraq stretches beyond what is reasonable. The people you call conspiracy prophets are presenting opinions/evidence that have previously been voiced in other quarters, especially by the Israelis.

Pillar’s attack piece seeks to rewrite history as to the actual intelligence situation prior to the invasion. Everyone, including the previous Clinton administration, all foreign intelligence services and even Saddam (apparently) believed that there was a weapons program in Iraq. Clearly, not acting on this would be irresponsible. Attempting to change perceptions of this fact by presenting a hypothetical psychological analysis of the bureaucracy of our intelligence community is equally irresponsible…

Feb 22, 2006 - 10:20 am 5. dclydew:

O3,

Well, in reading Pillar’s piece it seems to me that he clearly stated that everyone (including Clinton) thought there were WMD’s. Note the third paragraph:

The administration defended itself by pointing out that it was not alone in its view that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and active weapons programs, however mistaken that view may have been.

In this regard, the Bush administration was quite right: its perception of Saddam’s weapons capacities was shared by the Clinton administration, congressional Democrats, and most other Western governments and intelligence services.

He’s not rewriting history. He clearly states that everyone, not just Mr. Bush thought there were WMD’s.

His contention with the current Administration is that they, unlike everyone else, decided that instead of containment, invasion was necessary. He holds this has more to do with policy (shake up the Middle East) than with intelligence (Iraq’s WMD’s). It’s really quite clear if you read the original article.

Notice too what he says about all the other Intelligence groups that believed Saddam did have WMD’s: Official intelligence on Iraqi weapons programs was flawed, but even with its flaws, it was not what led to the war. On the issue that mattered most, the intelligence community judged that Iraq probably was several years away from developing a nuclear weapon. The October 2002 NIE also judged that Saddam was unlikely to use WMD against the United States unless his regime was placed in mortal danger.

If you are stating that he’s lying here and rewriting history, then I’ll be more than happy to look at any evidence you may have to support this contention.

Here’s another quote from the article: “But the greatest discrepancy between the administration’s public statements and the intelligence community’s judgments concerned not WMD (there was indeed a broad consensus that such programs existed)….”

In fact, after rereading the article twice, I have yet to find anything that even approaches ‘rewriting history’. He has some criticism for the way in which intelligence was used to justify invasion and he points out some issues with using raw intelligence as PR fodder. I was unable to find any place where he argued that no weapons existed or that “Bush Lied”. He doesn’t even discuss ‘what happened to the WMD’s” he seems only to discuss issues with the interaction between the administration and the intel community.

Did you read a different paper than I did? Instead of the summary article, I read the piece in question, found at: http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20060301faessay85202-p0/paul-r-pillar/intelligence-policy-and-the-war-in-iraq.html

Please feel free to show me any quotes I may have missed where he rewrites history.

Thanks

Feb 22, 2006 - 11:27 am 6. OJ:

dclydew:

It’s funny that you can read the same piece as I did and not conclude that the entire article suggests that Bush misled the American people by cherry-picking raw data. The whole paper is accusatory.

I would also like to point out that we ALL know that the Europeans and the US had different opinions as to how to best deal with the matter – but that’s not what we are discussing here – nor is it what Pillar discusses. He only mentions it on the fly in an effort to tone down the very well established fact that everyone thought Saddam had weapons.

As to the link to terrorism – I suggest you read section 5 in the following link: http://www.oregontaxnews.com/iraq-report.htm#_edn60#_edn60

Seems like we had plenty of reason to ‘turn over the same stone twice and scratch the dirt’.

It is clear to me that Pillar has an axe to grind with the administration. Perhaps he is also trying to shift any blame for faulty intelligence estimates (after all he was in charge of the ME for 5 years).

Say what you will, this paper never provides one solid piece of evidence saying that Saddam did not have a program – probably because none exists. Still, it faults our administration’s handling of intelligence directives through hypothetical retrospective psycho-analysis of unnamed agents working at the CIA… If that’s not rewriting history…..? You tell me!

Feb 22, 2006 - 2:45 pm 7. dclydew:

O3,

But nowhere does he say that they didn’t have weapons of mass destruction. Nowhere. Nowhere does he say that Bush lied about the presence of WMD’s or had reason to believe that they didn’t exist. His argument is that Bush decided to invade then used raw intelligence to support the decision. His paper is about the danger of Intel following policy (instead of the other way around). Not only the EU but he quotes the US Intel’s view of Iraq :

, the intelligence community judged that Iraq probably was several years away from developing a nuclear weapon. The October 2002 NIE also judged that Saddam was unlikely to use WMD against the United States unless his regime was placed in mortal danger.

Now, if you can provide me with evidence that this is untrue, then thats cool… I don’t necessarily believe this guy.

Now let’s look at these two folks:

Mr. Tierney has audiotapes which have discussions between Saddam and his associates. some of these obviously appear to speak about WMD’s.

Mr. Pillar speaks about the way in which intelligence was used (not the viability of such intelligence). He never says anywhere that Iraq doesn’t/didn’t have WMD’s, he only says that the intel was used to support policy, instead of policy being made around the intel.

These two views are not particularly contrasting. Both views permit WMD’s to have existed. Both views indicate that there was lots of reasons to think Saddam had access to some WMD’s. Neither of these two disagree.

If I were in a superior position to Mr. Tierney and he told me that God said check out Site Foo, because of a dream, I’d check it out. I think there may be a number of possible explainations for ’supernatural’ events and think that discounting it simply because the messenger hasn’t the wit to present the info in a format useable by anyone other than Coast to Coast.

This whole issue could easily be put to bed. The US should investigate his mysterious house by the river and either find atomic research, or not. If so, then bully for Mr. Tierney. If not, then I think we are probably dealing with a crackpot.

However, to immediately latch on to someone who sounds like a crackpot, who has provided no emperical evidence of his claims and adds conspiracy theories about every major terrorist attack since 1991 (with no proof whatsoever), seems a bit desperate, to me.

If you could provide me with some quotes from Mr Pillar, which supports you contention that he is rewriting history, I would appreciate it. I have no problem with the idea that I may have missed something or read it incorrectly (twice). Please, point out the quote so I can see exactly what you speak of.

Feb 23, 2006 - 7:16 am 8. OJ:

Certainly I see what you are trying to say. However, dclydew, differentiating between policy dictating intelligence operations vs intelligence dictating policy is an art of splitting hairs. You must realize that the decision to invade Iraq (or the decision to direct intelligence resources) were not created in a vacuum. Countless volumes of data already existed and subsequent bits of pieces that were turned up during the Bush administration’s tenure only added to the overall picture. In my opinion, a decision to invade could already have been made back in 1998 when Clinton opted for conducting bombing raids instead. Few things have changed since then…

The problem here is, as I mentioned earlier, that there is a difference in opinion about how to handle the situation. Pillar is obviously convinced that containment provided America with enough of a security blanket – whereas us ‘hawks’ felt that there simply was no reason to gamble with the rationale of a madman. I especially like the assessment that Saddam was ‘unlikely’ to use WMDs against American interests… Nice!

I would also like to mention that I have made not a single reference to Mr. Tierney. If you read my article you will see that the thrust of my argument comes from statements made by Former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense John. A. Shaw, who paints a much different view of the available intelligence. You can read what I wrote here: http://www.rightviews.com/article.php?id=346 The page contains links to Shaw’s findings.

Finally, since you do not seem to grasp the main point of the paper completely, I will attempt to explain to you what the actual meaning of the piece is. Pillar argues that the Bush administration intentionally used policy to direct intelligence measures which resulted in a false interpretation of the data at hand. This suggests: the administration falsely represented the real situation by using select material and omitting relevant information and procedures. This means Pillar attempts to affirm, through omitting the huge volumes of information available to us, that Bush intentionally misled the country by using information it knew to be inaccurate. This is where Pillar seeks to rewrite history by second guessing decisions made at the White House and offering his own brand of psycho analysis of CIA personnel and only mentioning in passing, that we had quite compelling evidence even before Bush came to office that Saddam pursued WMD programs.

If Pillar had been able to produce a single piece of evidence suggesting that the Bush administration purposely neglected to pursue certain elements, or that they possessed clear and confirmed data offering a picture of a disarmed Iraq, I would agree that he has a paper to write. He does, however, not present any such evidence.

Feb 23, 2006 - 8:30 am 9. dclydew:

I really think you may be misreading Pillar’s paper. I think he obviously admits right off that most Intel groups believed that there were WMD’s.

. Pillar is obviously convinced that containment provided America with enough of a security blanket – whereas us ‘hawks’ felt that there simply was no reason to gamble with the rationale of a madman. I especially like the assessment that Saddam was ‘unlikely’ to use WMDs against American interests… Nice!

Pillar quotes US Intel as being convienced that containment provided America with a security blanket. Pillar quotes US Intel that Saddam was unlikely to use WMD’s against American Interests. However, you’re correct (and directly in line with Pillar’s paper) in that Hawkish policies decided not to gamble with a madman.

According to you and Pillar, it was policy (don’t gamble with madmen, shake up the ME) not intelligence, which felt that Saddam was not a threat, which felt that Saddam was YEARS away from Nukes and which felt that squite a bit of the evidence used was suspect (yellowcake etc).

His argument seems summed up as, “Hawks, not Intelligence made the decision to go to war.” This seems to connect with what you just stated and with the quotes he uses in his paper. He thinks that this is an inappropriate way to use Intel and I suppose he’s entitled to that opinion. However, to claim that he’s rewriting hisotry sound like reactionary hysteria and you have yet to provide me with a single quote to back up your claim. Instead you simply provide your interpertation of what he wrote and base your claims on that.

I really would like to see something to support your position, its difficult to debate someone who simply speaks to their interpertation with no evidence.

Feb 23, 2006 - 8:45 am 10. OJ:

There are many references in Pillar’s paper to what is going on here. Look at this paragraph on the first page for instance:

“A view broadly held in the United States and even more so overseas was that deterrence of Iraq was working, that Saddam was being kept “in his box,” and that the best way to deal with the weapons problem was through an aggressive inspections program to supplement the sanctions already in place. That the administration arrived at so different a policy solution indicates that its decision to topple Saddam was driven by other factors — namely, the desire to shake up the sclerotic power structures of the Middle East and hasten the spread of more liberal politics and economics in the region.”

‘A view broadly held…’. This is a vague and misleading statement. I think that you will find the number of people in the US thinking that toppling Saddam was a better option than containment – we have had government funded programs in place to do just that for a long time. Pillar uses this false premise as a stepping stone to conclude that there had to be another reason. I disagree with this notion.

As an aside, clearly you must realize that there are numerous reasons for going into Iraq – at the time that we did – that simply are not viable for public consumption. Next door to Iraq you have an ongoing nucelar weapons program that might require a military option to be prevented. Quoted from page two of Pillar’s paper: “On the issue that mattered most, the intelligence community judged that Iraq probably was several years away from developing a nuclear weapon.” Several years, of course would put us close to present day. Sanctions and inspections were not working sufficiently well to assure us that no clandestine program was underway in Iraq. I am sure you see the difficulty in dealing with two hostile regimes in the same region getting close to testing nuclear weapons… Another potential consideration is that dealing with Iran might require sanctions on their oil export. Knowing that we would have to confront Iran over the next few years, having access to Iraqi oil becomes invaluable and a neccessity. These reasons are of course not politically sustainable. Yet they are sound from a geopolitical approach and vital to our national security. These are elements not considered when dealing with the decision to go into Iraq. There are many more such parameters and probably some that I cant even begin to think of. I do understand that this may be off the mark a bit as to our argument here but considering that Pillar was in charge of the Middle East, he must have known about Irans aspirations.

You decide, dclydew, what the implications are here…:
“The Bush administration deviated from the professional standard not only in using policy to drive intelligence, but also in aggressively using intelligence to win public support for its decision to go to war. This meant selectively adducing data — “cherry-picking” — rather than using the intelligence community’s own analytic judgments.”

I have already discussed how erroneous this next statement is – in the post 9/11 world, not thoroughly exploring even the slightest hint of a connection would be criminally irresponsible. Yet Pillar argues that directing intelligence resources to the matter was a mistake… This is not an honest reflection of the mood.
“In the shadowy world of international terrorism, almost anyone can be “linked” to almost anyone else if enough effort is made to find evidence of casual contacts, the mentioning of names in the same breath, or indications of common travels or experiences. Even the most minimal and circumstantial data can be adduced as evidence of a “relationship,” ignoring the important question of whether a given regime actually supports a given terrorist group and the fact that relationships can be competitive or distrustful rather than cooperative.”

This next segment is where Pillar shows his bias and where his argument falls apart:
“On the issue of Iraqi WMD, dozens of analysts throughout the intelligence community were making many judgments on many different issues based on fragmentary and ambiguous evidence. The differences between sound intelligence analysis (bearing in mind the gaps in information) and the flawed analysis that actually was produced had to do mainly with matters of caveat, nuance, and word choice. The opportunities for bias were numerous. It may not be possible to point to one key instance of such bending or to measure the cumulative effect of such pressure. But the effect was probably significant.”
This is completely hypothetical and Pillar himself states that there is no hard evidence of any such instance – pure speculation.

“The commission failed to address exactly why managers were inconsistent: they wanted to avoid the unpleasantness of laying unwelcome analysis on a policymaker’s desk.” – Highly speculative without evidence.

“That is what happened when the Bush administration repeatedly called on the intelligence community to uncover more material that would contribute to the case for war.” Does Pillar have any evidence that the Bush administration asked for material that would contribute to the case for war? If so, where is it?

This last quote exemplifies the very biased position that Pillar takes. He opens the paper by suggesting something, uses speculative arguments to back up the position and then, refers to it as a known fact to further his argument later.

We can go on and do this but I hope that the statements I have provided will begin to open your eyes as to the ‘rewriting of history’.

Feb 23, 2006 - 9:34 am 11. dclydew:

‘A view broadly held…’. This is a vague and misleading statement. I think that you will find the number of people in the US thinking that toppling Saddam was a better option than containment

Err, he’s refering to the Intelligence communities in the US and Europe, not the citizens as your comment appears to. I’m sure lots of hawkish citizens felt that taking down Saddam was a good idea… but I’m pretty sure from the context, that Pillar is speaking to the pervailing view of intelligence analysts in the US and abroad. From the evidence I’ve seen so far, I have not seem anything that would discredit this statement.

As an aside, clearly you must realize that there are numerous reasons for going into Iraq

Absolutely. In fact, many of them are as you mentioned. However, Pillar doesn’t say this isn’t the case. In fact, his paper says that its for these ‘numerous reasons’ (not actual intel) that the policy to go to war was decided.

From the paper: the administration… decision to topple Saddam was driven by other factors — namely, the desire to shake up the sclerotic power structures of the Middle East and hasten the spread of more liberal politics and economics in the region.

This concurs with what you stated.

“The Bush administration deviated from the professional standard not only in using policy to drive intelligence, but also in aggressively using intelligence to win public support for its decision to go to war. This meant selectively adducing data — “cherry-picking” — rather than using the intelligence community’s own analytic judgments.”

Do you disagree with this statement?

From all the information I’ve seen, this seems to be exactly what happened. All intel agencies thought that Saddam had some WMD’s, however the prevailing view was that he was not a threat and was adaquately contained. This appears to connect with information we’ve seen since the invasion. Traditionally an Administration would look at the assesment of the Intel community and base policy off of that. In this case, it means that the Administration would not have invaded, since intel said “Not a threat”.

However, the Administration appears to have had other reasons for invasion (as you pointed out). So they used some intel (including some that was considered untrusted by the intel community) to support the invasion. I fail to see how this scenario deviates from what the evidence indicates happened. Are you saying that most of our Intel community thought Saddam was an imminent threat? If so, can you provide proof of this?

Pillar argues that directing intelligence resources to the matter was a mistake…

From a traditional Intel perspective, it is a mistake.

I think you are reacting in a very strong way to something that is a difference of opinion. Pillar is arguing that traditional Intelligence handling should have been followed, you seem to feel that 9/11 changed that. His arguments are based on how traditional intel has been handled and points to changes in the way that intel interacted with the administration and vice-versa. In areas where he delves into speculation, he uses terms that indicate its speculation.

I think that this paper was intended to jab at the Administration. I think he wrote it with a bias toward his own view of the situation. However, I do not think he’s “rewriting history”. Indeed, it seems to me that you are trying to rewrite his paper.

And none of this connects to our original argument, wherein you tried to place Pillar in disagreement with Mr. Tierney.

I quote: “It is interesting how Paul R. Pillar just days ago concluded something completely different in regards to the WMD intelligence.”

Mr. Pillar states nowhere that WMD’s did not exist or that WMD’s do not now exist. He only discusses how the intel was used. In fact, he states several times that everyone in the intelligence community (here and abroad) believe/d that Saddam had WMD’s.

This is in now way different from Mr. Tierney’s belief (Except that Mr. Tierney believes God some directs him in his hunt for WMD’s).

Mr. Pillar puts forth the conjecture that Intel was handled poorly, but he doesn’t say anywhere that it was ‘made up’. His paper supports the position that Iraq was believed to have WMD’s. His argument exists solely in they way in which tat intel was used.

However, neither Mr. Pillar, nor Mr. Tierney in either of their presentations have helped us find or prove the early beliefs. Mr. Tierney’s audiotapes may help to explain why the Intel community believed there were WMDs (because it sounds like Saddam believed they had WMD’s). However, it provides us with nothing actually useful. We have no way of determining if these tapes support “There really was a weapons program and they hid it in Syria” (which isn’t supported anywhere on the tapes), or, “There’s really no weapons program and the Iraqi Scientists were lying to get more money”, as David Kay believes.

So, I disagree that Mr. Pillar is trying to rewrite history. I think he’s providing a shaded view (his opinion) of what happened. It may not be a pure reflection of history, but it certianly doesn’t appear in direct conflict with history.

I also disagree that Mr. Pillar and Mr. Tierney’s work are opposing. Mr. Pillar never seems to indicate that WMD’s didn’t exist, Mr. Tierney never seems to indicate that the administration didn’t cherry pick intelligence.

Feb 23, 2006 - 10:37 am 12. OJ:

This is exactly my point… Pillar writes an opinion piece, stating many assertions which were formulated from hyperbolas as fact. In the very politicized world we live in, this paper was used by many liberal media outlets to further their argument that Bush misled the nation.

I will also content that many professionals inside the CIA (Tenet included) felt that containment in the post 9/11 era was too risky.

Avoiding to comment on the sections I highlighted as pure speculation and the one that uses this specualtion to establish a ‘fact’, and rather focus on the ’standard intelligence procedures vs post 9/11 ones’ which Pillar only uses to set up his argument, doesn’t adress the apparent bias in his comment.

Further, the ‘cherry picking’ reference is completely disingeneous. The so called ‘cherry picked intel’ was only used to further known intelligence, much of which was collected prior to Bush arriving at the White House. Pillar says these snippets of intel was used to make the case for war – I say it was used to supplement a vast volume of intelligence that already existed.

Further, if as Shaw asserts, much of the hardware was moved out from Iraq in the months leading up to invasion – something backed by Powell’s testimony at the UN – Pillar’s argument is a mute point. There was, in that case, a HUGE reason to make the case for war and Pillar’s argument that containment was working falls out the window.

By the way, Pillar’s very assertion that containment was a viable option, crosses the same line he is drawing in the sand himself – does advocating for containment not relate to policy? We have no intelligence suggesting that containment was working – especially if Shaw and Powell are correct.

Feb 23, 2006 - 11:06 am 13. OJ:

OJ: Smiles!

Feb 23, 2006 - 9:18 pm 14. dclydew:

Pillar writes an opinion piece, stating many assertions which were formulated from hyperbolas as fact.

Hyperbole? Do you have evidence that it’s hyperbole, or do you believe it to be hyperbole because you disagree with it?

I will also content that many professionals inside the CIA (Tenet included) felt that containment in the post 9/11 era was too risky.

Do you have evidence for that?

doesn’t adress the apparent bias in his comment.

Yarg. That’s because his main thrust of the article was about how intel was used. In the areas you are pointing to as speculation, you yourself stated “This is completely hypothetical and Pillar himself states that there is no hard evidence of any such instance “…

This is how papers are written. There are facts and there are opinions. Facts used quoted source materials as proof, Opinions are caveated as opinions. Pillar does exactly that. Where he is speaking of facts, he uses direct quotes from sources. Where he is speaking of his opinions, conclusions and inferences, he includes the necessary caveats to indicate that these are not facts, but his opinions or conclusions.

I’m not sure what your background is, but from my experience this appears as a perfectly legitimate paper. I personally think he could have either provided more evidence for his conclusions, or have made less statements of opinion… If I were grading it, he’d probably get a B-. However, it seems in no way an attempt to rewrite history, to me.

“I say it was used to supplement a vast volume of intelligence that already existed.”

Well, yes, you say that… but what basis do you have for such statements? Do you have access to this vast volume of intelligence? Do you have hard emperical evidence that this intelligence was accurate? If not, how is your ’say so’, any more valuable that Pillar’s opinion?

Further, if as Shaw asserts, much of the hardware was moved out from Iraq in the months leading up to invasion – something backed by Powell’s testimony at the UN – Pillar’s argument is a mute point. There was, in that case, a HUGE reason to make the case for war and Pillar’s argument that containment was working falls out the window.

Sure, except we don’t know if Shaw is correct, and I don’t recall anything in Powell’s UN address that stated stuff was being moved out of the country. Indeed, even Powell appears to think that his UN address was incorrect in a number of areas.

Pillar’s very assertion that containment was a viable option, crosses the same line he is drawing in the sand himself – does advocating for containment not relate to policy?

In traditional intelligence, the Intelligence community does its job (for example, spy on Saddam’s WMDs), and then report their findings and conclusions to the Administration (”Due to this information we think Saddam is making Nukes”, or, “Due to this information we think containment is working”.) Pillar is saying that the latter comment is what the Intel community was reporting up. However, instead of using the conclusion, the Administration pulled in the raw intel and used the raw intel that supported their case (even though some of this raw intel had already been reviewed and discarded by the Intelligence community (the yellowcake issue for example).

I guess we’re not going to agree on this, alas. But, I think we’ve successfully held a rather useful debate without falling into namecalling and the usual crap one sees on blogs.

Thanks for the good debate

Feb 24, 2006 - 9:05 am 15. OJ:

Good Debates are always welcomed.
Name calling is usually resorted to when someone has been out-debated.

Although I don’t agree with your position, I will contend that you argued your points well!

You are always welcome to engage in constructive debate at http://www.rightviews.com – we welcome most perspectives.

Til Next Time… !

Feb 28, 2006 - 11:26 am

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